Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The San Borja to Trinidad road is notoriously bad and can be closed for long periods
during the wet season. It's frustrating for anybody wanting to travel between Rur-
renabaque and Trinidad, and even more so when transportation that sets out from Rurre
bound for Trinidad announces, after a little local consultation at San Borja, that they can
go no further. In theory, more services to Trinidad depart from San Borja than from Rurre,
so you may find yourself here whether you like it or not, either looking for a connection,
or simply stranded and waiting.
In the dry season buses pull out several times daily from the bus terminal (3km south of
the plaza; B$4 by moto-taxi) for the Reserva Biosférica del Beni (B$20, 1½ hours), San
Ignacio de Moxos (B$40, five hours), Trinidad (B$50, eight to 12 hours) and Santa Cruz
(B$100, 20 to 24 hours). During the wet season the trip to Trinidad is sometimes attemp-
ted by privately owned 4WD vehicles (per person B$100) commissioned by the bus com-
panies, though whether they depart or not depends on the whim of the driver. There are
frequent
micro
services to Rurrenabaque (B$50, nine hours), which depart when full, or in
the wet season you'll need a 4WD taxi (B$80 per person).
If you're Trinidad-bound, note that the Río Mamoré
balsa
(raft) crossings close at 6pm,
and you need five to six hours to reach them from San Borja. There are no accommoda-
tions on either side of the crossing, so give yourself plenty of time. Watch for pink river
dolphins at river crossings.
Reserva Biosférica del Beni
Created by Conservation International in 1982 as a loosely protected natural area, the
334,200-hectare Beni Biosphere Reserve was recognized by Unesco in 1986 as a 'Man &
the Biosphere Reserve,' and received official recognition the following year through a pi-
oneering debt swap agreement with the Bolivian government.
The adjacent
Reserva Forestal Chimane
, a 1.15-million-hectare buffer zone and indi-
genous reserve, has been set aside for sustainable subsistence use by the 1200 Chimane
people living there. The combined areas are home to at least 500 bird species as well as
more than 100 mammals and myriad reptiles, amphibians and insects.
The Chimane reserve was threatened in 1990 when the government decided to open the
area to loggers. Seven hundred Chimanes and representatives of other tribes staged a
march from Trinidad to La Paz in protest at the decision that would amount to the whole-
sale destruction of their land. Logging concessions were changed but not altogether re-
voked, and the problems continue.
